Case-sensitivity: why -- or why not? (was Re: Damnation!)

[richard_chamberlain]

To repeat what lots of people have already said the difficulties with case
should be solved with an IDE not with altering the language.

You'll notice that a url is case sensitive and urls are bandied about as
currency so in my opinion I think the population can generally handle case.

>>This is something Windows and Macintosh do right -
>>removing a cause of error for no real limitation in functionality.

I come from a Macintosh / Windows background but I think the amount of
messages this has created demonstrates that 'no real limitation in
functionality' isn't totally true.

Richard
Neil Hodgson <neilh at scintilla.org> wrote in message
news:v_NV4.2148$sW4.12967 at news-server.bigpond.net.au...
> > When we teach our children to write we teach them case sensitivity, I do
> not
> > remember any governing body suggesting we should drop case sensitivity
> from
> > written language in order that 'everyone' will therefore be able to
write.
> >
> > I also cannot believe that this is a difficult lesson to learn.
> >
> > How many times would you have to be told before you understood it? Once
or
> > twice?
>
>    While I /know/ that Unix file names are case sensitive, that doesn't
stop
> me from mistyping them. This is something Windows and Macintosh do right -
> removing a cause of error for no real limitation in functionality.
>
>    I would extend the same scheme to variable naming in Py3K. Names have
one
> and only one capitalisation. Other capitalisations are an error. The IDEs
> can provide different styles of help here, from no action through
> highlighting miscapitalisation to automatic case changing.
>
>    Some people have been using a=A(). Even me. But is this something that
> you really feel should be encouraged? Or is it a source of ambiguity and
> potential misunderstanding.
>
>    Neil
>
>